Location Location Location

Fellow Genealogist Linda Robbins posted a question to genealogist today----

I would like to know for fun with a sampling of how people spend their evenings watching TV. Please respond if you have your laptop with you while you watch TV. Also, what is your favorite laptop activity while you use it in front of the TV? I'll start: check email, read Facebook entries and respond, and check for gene...alogy information. Do you use a split screen or 4google?

I responded today with

hee hee we have three tvs but my husband thinks: me on the puter and him watching his tv (in the same room) counts as "together" time!! I use laptop on occasion but prefer desk top---near printer, with note books open, taking notes, trying to remember where and when I found data for my genealogy.

And the reason I posted this is because today I am working on location location location ---- as different lines of my family migrated west from the east coast --- I see how the families sometimes criss crossed paths, were within 200 miles a part but were not brought together until they all migrate to California.

I have been working names, dates, location. I am at a place in my family studies that would benefit with a road trip. But if I go to these places I want to be as efficient and effective as possible. So instead of following one lineage I want to get all lineages within a 100 miles radius done at one time.

The Scottish in me wants the full value of her nickel. And the crazy in me wants to do it all!!!

I am in the process of developing new folders by locations:

a folder for my Hayley lineage:
Lake County Tennessee
Ennis County, Texas
Sulpher, Oklahoma

a folder for my Reed lineage:
Howell Missouri
Springfield Mass.
El Paseo, Texas
Okema, Oklahoma

a folder for my sister-in-laws Cancimella lineage:
Ohio
New York

Making detail notes to identify all families at these location, dates and all land deeds, addresses on census records, location of children's birth, and marriages, from where the parents came, etc. For each location/for each lineage/for each family group to identify and provide a designated folder. These folders will be used to fill with newspaper articles, documents, photos to bring home and record and file as required.

To plan for this trip (as explained above)-----My pc, dining room table, and floor around my desk is surrounded with atlases, family group charts, notebooks, airline destination maps, contact people locations maps, and contact information. A good way to review this would to be to make common sized maps, print them to overlays, and compare maps. This would help to plan my trip.

Next I will add this data to an excel file: with data by location, town/city to visit, family group, family location data, what I am looking for, and finally results. I will follow up with blogs as I develop my trip(s). I will let you know how many line items I added to my excel file. After developing a spreadsheet, maybe I will guesstimate a success level to complete my results column.

OK you may say ----- this seems a bit time consuming but this is a piece of cake for me. I use to plan for camping trips, trips to Hawaii, and just daily life with 7 very active children. Mapping out is how I tried to put everything in a family trip. This is also why most of my children hate any vacation too much planned!!!!

My children are teaching me to relax a little. By over planning sometimes I would miss the awwwwwww of the trip. I must design in my plan more tolerance for just being there time. When other genealogist share their awwwww times, I realize in my very task oriented way I have missed the awwwwww of some of this work.

But we live and, if we are smart, we learn. Learn about our past, or future, and hopefully how to live and enjoy this life more fully and enjoyably.

Happy Journey Everyone, Ruth